Vlasta Z. v. San Bernardino County Welfare Department

Bedrich G. fled Czechoslovakia in 1968 with his two children and entered the United States as a political refugee. After Bed-rich died in 1969, the juvenile court took jurisdiction over the children and placed custody with foster parents in California. Their mother, a resident of Czechoslovakia, now seeks to recover custody of her children. The juvenile court, however, ruled that the best interests of the children would be promoted by continuing their placement with the foster parents; the mother appeals from that order. 1

The present case is the first juvenile court custody dispute to come before us since passage of the Family Law Act in 1969 and the only reported case, to our knowledge, in which a superior court has awarded custody to a nonparent against the claim of a parent expressly found fit to care for the children. These circumstances compel us to inquire into the relation *683 ship of the Family Law Act to custody proceedings under the Juvenile Court Law. We have concluded that Civil Code section 4600 governs custody awards in juvenile court proceedings, and that under this section it is no longer essential that a court, to award custody to a nonparent, find the…